Evie McDaniel of Jonathan Alder prepares to receive the baton from Liza Streit during the 4×800 meter relay race at the Division II regional meet at Lexington High School on Thursday. The team took first place with a time of 9:34 to advance to the state meet. (Journal-Tribune photo by Sam Dillon)
The first day of the Division II regional track and field meet was bitter sweet for Jonathan Alder.
Some Pioneers will be moving on to the state meet, others took the podium and a few ended their season.
The Lady Pioneers’ 4×800-meter relay team took the top spot in the race with a time of 9:34.
The foursome of Elaine Winslow, Liza Streit, Evie McDaniel and Morgan Hicks went into the race as the two-seed with a time of 9:47 and shaved 13 seconds off its previous time to take first place.
Hicks, as the anchor leg, started the final 800 meters in second place.
She paced her Gilmour Academy opponent through the first 600 meters of the leg.
During the final turn, Hicks made her move and started to close the gap.
With less than 50 meters remaining, Hicks was a stride behind Mary Lombardo of Gilmour. Lombardo stumbled in the final 10 meters as Hicks past her to win the race.
The Pioneers also neared success in the boys discus.
Zachary Russell made it through to the finals where he took the final podium spot, eighth place, with a toss of 134-11.
The top four placers advanced to the state meet.
The cut-off to qualify for the state was a toss of 144-3.
The following Pioneer runners’ season ended at the regional when they failed to finish in the top four to advance to finals or top eight to qualify for the regionals finals.
The Lady Pioneer 4×100-meter relay team of Laura Detweiler, Josilyn Zuro, Hailey Lisska and Madeleine Freyhof finished in 16th place with a time of 55.33.
The relay team struggled with a handoff. A dropped baton led to the slow time.
In the 4×200-meter relay, the Lady Pioneer team of Jessica Kelley, Natalie Heflin, Lisska and Olivia Finke missed qualifying for the regional finals by six-tenths of a second, taking ninth place with a time of 1:49.94.
The Lady Pioneers’ 4×400-meter team of Winslow, Heflin, Finke and Kelley took 12th place in the race with a time of 4:14.
Freyhof also competed in the 100-meter dash where she took 11th place with a time of 13.29.
Kelley took 10th place in the 400-meter dash with a time of 1:02.
Neither qualified for the regional finals.
The Jon Alder boys 4×800-meter relay team of Jonas Watkins, Matthew Perkey, Sergey Dutt and Colyn McDaniel placed 11th in 8:34.96.
Jonathan Alder and North Union will each have athletes competing in Saturday’s regional finals.
The distance events – 800, 1600 and 3200 – will be run as finals.
Hicks will compete in both the 1600 and 3200.
North Union’s Jacob Willis will run in the 1600
JA’s Joey Walker will compete in the high jump and North Union’s Drue Duncan will compete in the shot put.
Field events are scheduled to start at 11 a.m. and track events are scheduled to begin at 12:30 p.m.
Zachary Russell of Jonathan Alder hurls the discus during the Division II regional meet at Lexington High School on Thursday. Russell made the podium with a toss of 134-11 to take eighth place. (Journal-Tribune photo by Sam Dillon)